Mark my words: America will *not* see the scheduled "migration of material to the public domain" in 2019. Between now and then, copyright holders will successfully lobby Congress for yet another retrospective extension of copyright, thus depriving the American people of yet another slice of the benefit that is due to them under the agreement by which they granted the copyright in the first place.

Copyright holders have no intention of keeping their side of the bargain. Having been granted the right to milk the back-catalog for a limited time, they intend to keep milking it forever.

If the copyright holders are successful, they will probably just have proven that the political system is broken. For example, in Senate Report 104-315 ( Senate Report 104-315 ) , the following is given as a reason for copyright extension:
"In addition to strengthening existing incentives to create new and derivative works, the 20-year extension of copyright protection will provide the important collateral benefit of creating incentives to preserve existing works. Until now, copyrighted works have been fixed in perishable media, such as records, film, audiotape, paper, or canvas. Copies or reproductions of these works usually suffer significant degradation of quality. The digital revolution offers a solution to the difficulties of film, video, and audio preservation, and offers exciting possibilities for storage and dissemination of other types of works as well. However, to transfer such works into a digital format costs a great deal of money—money which must come either from public or private sources.
Many of the works we wish to preserve, including the motion pictures and musical works from the 1920’s and 1930’s that form such an extraordinary part of our Nation’s cultural heritage, will soon fall into the public domain. Once in the public domain, the exclusive right to reproduce these works will no longer be protected. Because digital formatting enables the creation of perfect reproductions at little or no cost, there is a tremendous disincentive to investing the huge sums of money necessary to transfer these works to a digital format, absent some assurance of an adequate return on that investment. By extending the current copyright term for works that have not yet fallen into the public domain, including the term for works-made-for-hire (e.g., motion pictures), the bill will create such an assurance by providing copyright owners at least 20 years to recoup their investment. More important, the American public will benefit from having these cultural treasures available in an easily reproducible and indelible format."
It will be very hard to argue such a case now with places like http://archive.org posting massive amounts of public domain works on the web. This leaves only the windfall to current copyright owners as the reason for copyright extension.

Republican Representative Howard Coble also claimed that copyright extension was good for consumers: "When works are protected by copyright, they attract investors who can exploit the work for profit." (Congressional Record, Volume 144, 1998, Coble, North Carolina, H1458) in debate over the Copyright Term Extension Act. This will be a hard claim to justify nowadays. (See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Copyright_Term_Extension_Act#March_25th.2C_... )

This statement is incorrect. America will never again see anything enter the public domain without serious reform of government. SCOTUS has effectively already signed off on serial extensions as long as the term remains finite.

Given the prlofetation of e books- the result of thecsplendid efforts of volunteer workers, (Google books is a mess) together with the simple fact that the great majority of books will not be reprinted, and will thus be inaccessible to readers (libraries are junking lots) it would be reasonable to establish procedures to legally oblige the waiveing of copyright restrictions for selected categories.

The present system represents in most cases a 'dog-in-the -manger' attitude.

My comment bears no relevance to Goog's problems in navigating copyright legilsation. I have difficulty in navigating the google site. I do not have this with Project Gutenberg: www.gutenberg.org (started in 1971)

I was very enthusiastic when GOOGLE began; how wonderful to have so many splendid books at ones fingertips.

The problem is that there are many books that are of interest, which are not out of copyright, which will never be reprinted and which are thus inaccessible (libraries are discarding books - you can find these at Strand Books.) In such cases the copyright legislation is irrelevant and thus I consider that owners of copyright should be requested to relinquish - or if they wish to recieve royalty payments, they must themselves be responsible for the preparation of the text in accordance with e book requirements.

Copyright law should be very much restricted both in time and category.

E books have changed the literary environment and our intellectual lifestyle, and our paloelithich legislators should be brought up-to- date!

It is hard to read this article without thinking about my primary gripe with reading The Economist using the app on iOS: The implementation prohibits one from selecting or copying text out of the articles, presumably to prevent copying. Being able to copy out a word would make it easy to look up the definition on Google or learn more about a topic. I'm often frustrated by this as I feel that the educational value I get from The Economist makes it well worth the annual subscription, but I am restrained from making the most of that.

This kind of prior restraint is a good example of what is wrong with copyright at the moment.

I observe that I have no such problem with the PC. I have an iPad - which is sometimes frustrating but it is a fine tool when traveling and visiting friends. On the iPad I can select text and copy, but it is a little clumsy.
With the PC I select text, open a new blank document, or e mail or whatever and simply drag the selected text over.
I suspect that your problem has nothing to do with the Economist. It is either the limitations of your equipment, or you should explore and experiment! (You should do this anyway, it is a lot of fun.)

I'm specifically referring to using the Newsstand-enabled app for The Economist. When browsing using Safari on the iPad (or any browser on the desktop), the ability to copy text is unhindered. It is when using the Newsstand-enabled app on the iPad that one cannot use the standard gesture of touching a word and being offered the option to copy it or have it defined. Other Newsstand-enabled apps support this.

Strong copyright and IP protection rules are beneficial when the context is a society (and technology state) where information is scarce. They become less beneficial - and in fact dysfunctional - in an information dense environment where much of the creativity consists of building new mashups from older materials. Canal and riverboat interests tried mightily to kill the railroad in the U.S.; Disney and others have had far more success in stomping on new media - which creates innovation and cultural growth from new mixtures of old information. Eventually, societies that give in to the old forms of technology lose, if for no other reason than more creative cultures outcompete them. But that doesn't stop the game.

So far as I know, the most recent copyright extension was the EU's extension of the recording copyright from 50 years to 70 years https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_Union_70_year_recording_copyright... This was only about recordings, so song writers would be unaffected. It would make for example a 50 year old recording of Bach public domain, but not say a 50 year old recording of a Rolling Stones song, since the copyright for the song would still exist. Examining what it took to pass this legislation is useful. First, it was proposed in the UK to extend the recording copyright to 95 years. This was defeated, so they proposed it in 2008 in the European Union. This failed, so they tried again in 2009 with 70 term instead, which passed the parliament, but took another two years before they managed to pass European Council. So despite the fact that this was a relatively minor change, there was enough resistance to cause it to fail in the UK, and delay it for three years in the EU and cause it to be reduced from a 95 years to 70 years. I expect that there will be much more resistance to a general copyright extension.

I signed it, even tho' I think 10 years is too short. However, I think 10 years is much more reasonable than the current authors life plus 70 years with no registration requirement.

Since this is shorter than the Berne minimum requirements (See the Berne Convention at: http://www.wipo.int/treaties/en/ip/berne/trtdocs_wo001.html ), getting to 10 years would be a challenge. However without changing Berne things like orphan works are much more of a challenge. Berne convention restricts requiring registration requirements with Article 5(2): "The enjoyment and the exercise of these rights shall not be subject to any formality"

The Berne convention does however state in Article 9 (2) that: "It shall be a matter for legislation in the countries of the Union to permit the reproduction of such works in certain special cases, provided that such reproduction does not conflict with a normal exploitation of the work and does not unreasonably prejudice the legitimate interests of the author." which maybe could be stretched to help out with orphan works which are not being normally exploited.

However the Berne convention is better than current US law in some cases. For example, under the Berne convention, copyrights for movies only last 50 years Article 7 (2), but under US law is 95 years. Copyrights for a new book last 70 years after the author's death under US law, but only 50 years after the author's death under the Berne convention Article 7 (1). For photographs, the term is 25 years under Berne, Article 7 (4), and 70 years after the photographer's death in US law.

For some cases it the current term under US law is longer than the Berne convention, for example, a work written in 1923 will expire in 2018 (Publication + 95 years), but if the author died in 1975, it would still be under copyright until 2025 (author death + 50 years).

Many of the problems with copyright can't really be fixed until the Berne convention is changed, and in the US and the EU copyright terms are even longer than the Berne convention requires.

That said, I think the petition is very worthwhile, and I hope it get enough signatures.

yakiv, unfortunately, it looks like the petition failed with 2,870 of the needed 25,000 signatures. I think I would like to try a different petition which just requests 1.) Reduce copyright terms to the minimum of current term or Berne convention requirement. 2.) Eliminate criminal penalties and civil fines for unregistered works that are not currently available (orphan works problem). 3.) study the issue to determine economically optimal terms for copyright.
My yahoo.com email address is jrincayc if you want to contact me.

A point to made about copyright beyond issues of fairness and profiteering: overly long copyright serves to bankrupt our culture. Consider a public domain character like Snow White that has appeared in countless incarnations over the decades, several times in the last year alone. That character and others like her are part of our common cultural vocabulary. If we create a copyright system that totally prevents new characters from entering that vocabulary, we are stifling future creation.
Copyright serves a purpose and it's hard to draw a line at where that purpose has been fulfilled, but clearly renewal ad infinitum is not the answer.

That will never happen, I can state categorically. Reversing copyright rules at this point for material that has already had extensions would be considered a "taking," almost assuredly. More likely, any changes would be procedural for work created from 1978 on, perhaps requiring different registration requirements, or for work created from a point following the change in law.

No copyright law since and including those changes made in 1978 have restricted any rights accrued by copyright holders.

The interests that have lobbied to get this far will use the argument that a retroactive reversal of term takes money away by taking property rights away. Whether valid or not, that's the argument that gets used.

A big issue could be addressed if we had something like the 28 years renewable in 10 year increments, but the renewal application needs to include a copy of the work, so that the public domain will have access to orphan works or works that have no current commercial value. One of the greatest losses is works that are no longer extant. They weren't immediately valued, and no-one was permitted to copy them, so all copies died or were tossed. Just avoiding that loss would be a large step in the right direction. Add a renewal fee to cover the management costs and the system will pay for itself. Disney will be able to keep steamboat willie forever, but will have to itemize any older works they want to keep.

I don't disagree with you on principle, but the indefinite extension would make it politically possible to pass - Disney etc. would only swallow the renewal fees if they would be able to get their "forever" extension. MAYBE you could get something like 108 year max (28 + 8 10-yr renewals) but it would be an uphill climb.

The justification for extension beyond death is to given the grieving orphans of the writer who died of TB working in a frozen garret the profits of their parents endeavours. This, combined with the extension of this to all descendants to avoid a few orphans being left out, justifies the present situation. Which is, of course, farcical. The just roll back would be to restore ALL works to the terms applicable when they were published - which was the incentive that caused their generation in the first place. Anything else is sheer profiteering.

Indeed --- under U.S. Law, the author of the work is considered to =BE= the Big Corporation.

Look at the fine print at the end of any TV show or motion picture: "For the purposes of interpreting the Berne Convention for the Protection of Literary and Artistic Works, the author of this film shall be considered to be the Sony Motion Picture Corporation." Or Disney. Or Viacom. Or whichever mega-corporation the reps where from who bought the rights to the screenplay from the _actual_ author of the screenplay that the Berne Convention was originally written in a vain and quixotic attempt to protect... :-(

I'm generally in favour of shorter copyright terms, but I can see one which instantly expired on the death of the author being problematic. Imagine an old or sick author being unable to sell a very good work because prospective buyers all (reasonably) think it'll likely become public-domain, hence commercially worthless, in the near future.

Copyrights in most of the world had a duration from creation, during which a creator could exploit the rights. Is 28 years, or even 56, too short? Compared to someone who creates a work at 21, lives to 85, and has his heirs or estate (or anyone to whom he sold his rights) protected it for 95 years thereafter? Surely 159 years of monopoly is over-sufficient?

I believe in that case, the copyright in the US and Europe would be 70 years after the author's death, or (85-21)+70 = 134 years, not 159. 134 years is still overly long. It is also interesting to consider what will happen if medical technology succeeds in creating really long lifespans.

G.F. - I'm not arguing against shorter copyrights, but against choosing "creator's lifetime" as the duration, since that's inherently variable and could result in copyrights expiring either decades or weeks after the work's creation. Better to have a fixed term defined in time (regardless of whether it expires before or after its creator does) than have the work's commercial value weirdly tied to how healthy its creator is.

Yes, sorry, I added 25 years there. For corporate authorship (work for hire and employee work), it's 95 years after publication. However, one of the methods companies get around this is by keeping the copyright in the author's name, but then requiring the author to assign nearly all the rights to the company. Thus, a publishing company could obtain 134 years of protection for a work in the above example that, if the work were honestly created, would only have 95 years' protection.

Jebedee: That may be so, but the explicit purpose of copyright in America, at least, is not for the gain of an individual, but to motivate innovation and creativity. Any gain is limited and a monopoly protecting use by others without permission was put in place to provide a short-term benefit.

Regardless, though, numerous studies (many of which may be found through the Duke centre's website) show that the vast majority of financial gain obtains in the first few years after the publication or release of a work, and less so thereafter. There are notable exceptions in which long after a work is created it is rediscovered and then published, adapted, and so forth. But the vast majority of those cases involve work in which copyright has lapsed and it is in the public domain.

A term of 56 years from publication (and perhaps longer for unpublished and unreleased works, as the current law allows in many cases) would seem sufficient to benefit a creator and heirs.

The extensions of copyright today largely benefit corporations who long ago purchased the rights from a creator or estate.

Take the Tolkien estate. J.R.R. Tolkien sold film rights for £100,000 decades before the Peter Jackson trilogy which grossed billions. It is unclear how that benefited Dr Tolkien or his heirs (or the foundations they've established). In the actual event, the rights sale wasn't sufficiently broad, and the Tolkien estate clawed out an enormous sum from the film's producers.

G.F. - I don't think I disagree with any of that, but it's not really opposed to what I said. To reiterate, in saying "Lifetime is a bad length" I'm not saying "Copyrights need to be much longer than that" (shorter is fine), just that, whether it's 1 decade or 10, they should just be a time length, not a function of when someone happened to drop dead.

if we're going to have a copyright-restriction system at all, then this would be an excellent arguement for returning to a system with SET time-limits, instead of one which results in us cheering on the death of as many creative people as possible, as soon as possible...

Copyright law is absurd, especially when compared with Patent Law. How can one possibly justify a greater monopoly protection to works of art, music and literature than to a life-saving drug or major inventive step in achieving fuel efficiency for motor vehicles which only get 20 years? All intellectual property is a gift of the state - the citizens and taxpayers through their legislative representatives. Why should that right be given except to further the public interest in creative people actually doing the creative work and then making it available to the public? And what creative people need more than say life or 25 years whichever is the greater as a reason to create and publish?
Now several countries have extended the absurdity to resales of artist's work on which a royalty is to be charged - in Australia, which has a peculiarly stupid Arts minister the right could extend for 150 years or even more. I suppose thats OK if you think that Agatha Christie's great-grandchildren should go on receiving income from The Mousetrap.....

It is however relatively easy to check and fairly unambiguous. First publication can be messy. For example what amount of revision constitutes a new work? What constitutes publication, does the writer printing up a few copies for some friends count? &c. Death on the other hand is pretty clear-cut.

Copyright in America is copywrong. If a rights-holder has made no bona-fide and successful effort to profit from owning the right, within, say, 5 or 10 years, the work ought to enter the public domain.

the sad thing is most people don't even care aboiut/haven't watched "steamboat willie" anymore.

the ironic thing is that "steamboat willie" was a parody short-film-cartoon, based on a buster keaton feature film, based on a book; & disney DID NOT pay any of the "preceeding authors" royalties, or secure the rights to make it. they/he did so under the "fair use" provisions of the usa's copyright law (parody is "protected" free speech).